Minestrone

Minestrone is a lovely simple hearty dish. Literally meaning “big soup”, it’s basically a thick soup made with vegetables and pasta or rice. It is commonly available with other Italian pasta dishes. To me, it is similar to Asian noodle soups.

I think the wonderful thing is that it doesn’t take much time to cook, you only need to wash one pot, and you have the soup, grain and vegetables all combined into one dish, no extra preparation is needed. Even though I do enjoy cooking, I don’t always like washing dishes. When I am busy with other things, and our ayi (housekeeper) is not available, I prefer to cook something simple like this. And it’s such a wonderful soup on a cold and rainy day, I can eat this soup with some nice vegan rye bread or whole grain bread.

Instructions
1. Slice the onion, shred the peppers, cube the carrot, slice the celery and chop the tomato.
2. Put the pot on a medium heat, add 1 tbsp olive oil, then add the onion and sauté for 1 minute.
3. Add the rest of the vegetables and continue sautéing for 3 minutes.
4. Add 500ml of vegetable stock, if you want to make it more watery add 700ml.
5. Add the sea shell pasta.
6. Cook, stirring constantly for 8 minutes.
7. Season with sea salt and black pepper, garnish with cilantro, serve!